Empyreal Environs

During the second protracted rain delay of today’s game I had enough time to rifle through some recent baseball news, some serious, some fun:

Jon Papelbon will probably be called up from Pawtucket to start on Tuesday, August 16th against the Tigers in Detroit. He would be replacing Wade Miller, who was placed on the 15-day disabled list on August 9th to make room for Mike Remlinger. Papelbon should find the vastness of Comerica Park somewhat of a relief to McCoy and Fenway as long as hitters don’t find the gaps.

First-round draft pick Craig Hansen, signed July 25th, was assigned to the Portland Sea Dogs on August 11th. The 21-year old was rated by Baseball America as having the best breaking ball and second-best fastball amongst draft-eligible college pitchers, was considered the draftee closest to being able to compete in the majors, and was the 4th pitching prospect in the June 2005 draft. The righty might have to readier sooner than he thinks given the current state of the Red Sox bullpen.

Larry Krueger, host of the pre-game show that aired on KNBR, was first given a one-week suspension and then fired from his position at radio affiliate of the San Francisco Giants. He said that the Giants were a team of “brain-dead Caribbean hitters hacking at slop nightly” and that field manager Felipe Alou’s mind had “turned to Cream of Wheat.” After the initial comments by Krueger, Alou responded on ESPN where he labeled Krueger as a “messenger of Satan.” KNBR parodied Alou by splicing his comments with sound bites from South Park. You would think that the suspension was warning enough. I’m not one to encourage censorship, but rather promote enough tolerance and understanding so that such obviously idiotic behavior wouldn’t be possible. Call me an idealist. Not knowing if KNBR is consistently racist and sexist like WEEI or Boston Dirt Dogs, I can’t say if the terminations of Krueger, program director Bob Agnew, and producer Tony Rhein were justified. The personnel responsible for making the follow up parody certainly weren’t prudent to so flagrantly and immediately taunt those they had wronged, however.

Rafael Palmeiro returned to baseball after serving his 10-game suspension for use of steroids, a banned substance under the collective bargaining agreement agreed to by MLB and MLBPA. As the designated hitter batting 6th, he went 0 for 4. The fourth player to achieve both 3,000+ hits and 500+ home runs failed to assist his team with his final at bat with the tying and winning runs on base.

An elephant named Laura threw out the first pitch of the August 13th West Michigan Whitecaps game versus the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers. The 23-year old star of Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, has decided to intentionally lower her profile by making small appearances in events across Michigan. “I couldn’t believe how far and how hard she throws it,” said Andrew Kown, a pitcher for the Whitecaps. Perhaps Laura can consider a second career in the national past time.

Finally, 12-year old Katie Brownell threw out the first pitch for the Los Angeles Dodgers on August 12th. Doesn’t seem very noteworthy, as many parks have kids throw out the first pitch, right? Brownell, however, is a Little League pitcher that threw a perfect game consisting entirely of strikeouts. She sat down 18 hitters in succession on May 14th in a game pitting her Oakfield-Alabama Little League Dodgers against the Yankees. She is the only girl in her league. The major league Yankees are trying to see if they can secure her services in time for a September call up.